National

Clean Water Action is fighting to protect communities from toxic power plant water pollution. For decades the power plant industry enjoyed a free pass to dump unlimited amounts of dangerous chemicals directly into our surface water, including sources of water used for drinking. As long overdue new national protections go into effect, we will be fighting back against the power plant industry’s push to weaken them.

“By allowing power plants to continue to dump chemicals into drinking water sources, Trump’s EPA is putting polluter profits above protecting public health,” said Jennifer Peters, National Water Programs Director for Clean Water Action. “For decades, power plants have been dumping toxic metals and other harmful contaminants, including bromide, which creates cancer-causing byproducts during drinking water treatment. Absent strong safeguards to limit this pollution, drinking water systems and their customers will continue to bear the burden of unchecked power plant water pollution.”

Clean Water Action’s analysis of supporting documents for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Proposed Effluent Limitations Guidelines and Standards for the Steam Electric Power Generating Point Source Category confirms that power plant discharges to surface water often include contaminants that experts consider to be “contaminants of concern” when found in drinking water.

In this issue: Putting Drinking Water First; EPA and Congress Take Action; Curbing Climate Pollution from the Oil and Gas Industry Now, Not Later; New Methane Standards in Pennsylvania; Aliso Canyon and Lost Hills: Symptons of a Broken System; and more.

From We All Live Downstream

Update: Thank you to all of our members who sent comments. The comment period is now closed - we will update you when there is an update.

We have a problem with coal-fired power plants dumping toxic pollutants such as lead, mercury, arsenic, and selenium into our waterways. These pollutants concentrate in the food chain, and already Maryland has fish consumption advisories for mercury in over ten species.

For years Clean Water Action and our allies have been fighting to rein in the largest toxic water polluter in the U.S. – coal-burning power plants. It’s no secret that coal-burning power plants pollute our air with unhealthy chemicals. What is not as well known is these plants have also been dumping arsenic, lead, mercury, selenium and other nasty pollutants directly into our lakes, rivers, streams, and bays for decades – far more than any other polluting industry. At the end of September, the U.S. Environmental Protection (EPA) finally closed this longstanding polluter loophole in our nation’s Clean Water Act.